summer we need you
Some nights you can hear seagulls on the roof though the sea is more than 400 kilometers away. There's a peacock float in my closet that I think is alive, like in toy story ; and sometimes i imagine on the other side of the cement there are no bars, but beach bars.
John Steinbeck he said once: What good would the heat of summer be without the cold of winter to give it sweetness? The problem, John, is that this winter has been longer than usual. In fact, since March 2020 we have a strange perception of time.
What good would the heat of summer be without the cold of winter to give it sweetness?
Now we don't say “Christmas 2019” , otherwise “Christmas before the pandemic” , and instead of “May 2022”, “when possible”. we have learned to value the seasons more and get a reward after too many alerts, like toll roads , hoping that some stretch will give us a truce.
We have our seat belts on more than ever, but still, we need feel some breeze through the window.
And although the light at the end of the tunnel is not entirely clear, perhaps a piece of summer allow us Breathe out that long-awaited breath.
IS THAT A LIGHTHOUSE OR THE SUMMER?
The last summer It was the little things. After a confined spring, we value the pleasure of reach the Mediterranean and make room for its blue in our gray scale. We let ourselves be caressed by the light and the air among the palm trees.
Even Spain seemed so fascinating and unexplored as the most lost of the Greek islands. We were pure innocence, appreciating the present that eluded us without thinking about an uncertain future.
Last summer was about the little things
Nevertheless, a year later, everything is different and many of us carry a backpack full of problems : the hyperventilations and accounts that shake, the work that accumulates (or is missing, because with this pandemic there is no middle ground) and the streets with too many doors down; that slow dystopia that consumes the world without being able to set concrete goals.
To alleviate this reality, we practice meditation in the mornings, we embrace philosophies from other cultures or paint mandalas. If you are more modern, you can even film your routine day by day at home, like now is carried on TikTok.
Everything serves to create new shelters. It's our way of resisting while we dream of cumbia nights in Colombia or that hostel in Vietnam where once you were invaded The fireflies.
The new, the inhospitable. Sometimes it even sneaks up on us the fear of forgetting everything that traveling meant. But beware, spoiler: perhaps what we need to resist is not so far away.
Beers by the sunset, as if it were a scene from 'Before Dark'
Summer has always been synonymous with relaxation and free time , of siestas with a fan and streets rocked by saltpeter. But this year, we could add all those longings that we have been collecting on so many lonely nights: lie down in the hammock and let the tide reach us; feeling like a child again in a fishing village inspiring so many pending rays of light, or that the sound of crickets in the middle of a Galician forest replaces that of car sirens . Bathe your feet in the warm sand playing at burying problems and experience that happiness that, even short and fleeting, is enough to restart.
A "first summer" that also means the reunion with nature, so overflowing with bougainvillea and cicadas, pines and prickly pears . The companion who never had to confine herself, the one who today awaits with open arms waiting for us to put everything we have learned to the test while she surrounds us, perhaps during that motorhome route or sipping wine under a hundred-year-old vine
But above all, this summer is a opportunity to reconnect with the people we love most . And it is that never before we value so much a call and a “ less to go ”, or after-dinner conversations that always end with a game of cards. There are friends who have been parents and whose children you only know through Zoom, two glasses full of stories in the usual bar and the looks of our elders saying that we have made some progress.
My Summer of Love
It unfolds like this a summer of promises , and the most important involves not letting your guard down. Because we know the world may never be the same again either. That it will be a long time until we secretly hug a loved one without asking ourselves what if...? That nothing is resolved. That you think about it more on Tinder dates and there's still time to dance glued to each other in a disco.
But at least we need to feel that we are alive again and closer to a reality where the only waves are those of the sea. Because this year, summer is more necessary, more lighthouse. even have some hope.